"Are we prepared to promote conditions in which the living contact with God can be reestablished? For our lives today have become godless to the point of complete vacuity. God is no longer with us in the conscious sense of the word. He is denied, ignored, excluded from every claim to have a part in our daily life." - Alfred Delp, S.J.

Monday, January 09, 2012

Hillary Clinton: Headmistress of Discipline.

Hillary believes in the coercive power of the State to promote LGBT rights... “laws have a teaching effect.” You vill obey!

“The Obama administration defends the human rights of LGBT people as part of our comprehensive human rights policy,” Secretary Clinton affirms. And to those who object, remember: “laws have a teaching effect.”

“Progress comes from changes in laws,” Clinton explains. “In many places, including my own country, legal protections have preceded, not followed, broader recognition of rights. Laws have a teaching effect….It is often the case that laws must change before fears about change dissipate.” - Hillary Clinton Pushes for Coercive Power of the State. And even more here.

41 comments:

No more coercive than civil rights laws that were passed to protect the rights of people of color and women.

The LGBT movement is the civil rights revolution of our time and people like you are on the wrong side of history, just like the southern racists were in the '60s and the patriarchy was in the '70s when they fought against rights for blacks and women respectively.

Gay and lesbian issues aside, Hillary Clinton has a valid point. If the US racial laws hadn't changed - and people made to obey - the South would have remained segregated for much longer. The changes in such laws definitely had a "teaching effect" and advanced a significant change in attitude. At the time, many in the South felt that the Federal government was "pushing the coercive power of the state" - and the State was morally right to take such a step. I propose that today, some forty years later, few would disagree. Mrs Clinton's observations are correct.

However, I think she is mistaken in applying this observation to the GLBT situation. The sea change which has taken place over the last 20 years or so (even amongst many orthodox Catholics) has not come from laws, but from an increasing number of people coming to know gays and lesbians as colleagues, friends and - as with Cardinal George and myself - family members.

I am certainly not raising my hand to say allow same sex marriages, but I do adhere to the Catechism's clear statement regarding homosexual people that "Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided." (2358)

Certainly we will see much less violence and unjust discrimination against those with same-sex attractions. But we already do see less of it, and that's not because of the law, but because of what parepidemos said.

Of course, the catch is that we cannot be jackbooted into accepting immorality, which is what gay sex is and always will be.

I see it like this: I am friends with gays in the same way I am friends with people who have sex outside of marriage and people who do drugs. I respect and pray for them as human beings, but I don't pretend I think what they are doing is cool. Usually, I ask no questions about people's sex lives and I avoid learning about it when the information is volunteered.

I know where I have been in the past, know where I have fallen, know where I have run headlong into sin and embraced and supported it, so far be it from me to treat anyone with contempt.

I wonder if Reality Check would even be on speaking terms with someone who is a devout Christian, but that's the difference - secularists are allowed to hate and be bigoted with impunity.

But Mrs. Clinton is a fool if she thinks that the law will make a difference. Abortion was made sacrosanct in 1973, yet the country is arguably more pro-life than it was then. The reason is simply because those who have been born since then are the ones "allowed" to be born, and that parents with pro-life views are more likely to reproduce and in higher numbers than anyone.

And it goes for most kinds of morality - those families who raise children with traditional values tend to reproduce at higher rates and tend to take a greater interest in their children's education than those who do not.

If secularism is an ideology which is fundamentally anti-children except as an accessory to one's self, an augmentation of the ego, which is exactly how they see marriage and children ("gay adoption" is especially about this), then it follows that they will have less children. Simple.

And "Reality" Check - most of the major churches, including the Catholic Church, was fully behind the Civil Rights movement.

"Moral conscience requires that, in every occasion, Christians give witness to the whole moral truth, which is contradicted both by approval of homosexual acts and unjust discrimination against homosexual persons. Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimization of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil." - http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20030731_homosexual-unions_en.html

To be a person of color, or a woman, is not an evil - hence their struggle for civil rights is just.

"The principles of respect and non-discrimination cannot be invoked to support legal recognition of homosexual unions. Differentiating between persons or refusing social recognition or benefits is unacceptable only when it is contrary to justice.(16) The denial of the social and legal status of marriage to forms of cohabitation that are not and cannot be marital is not opposed to justice; on the contrary, justice requires it." - ibid

Terry, Naturally, I agree that being female or a person of colour is not evil; but your phrasing of that sentence implies that a person who is homosexual IS evil.

If I am reading what you wrote correctly, then your assertion is completely unjustified. Even when it speaks of homosexual acts, the Catechism uses the term"intrinsically disordered" - a far less weighty expression than "evil". What the Catechism most certainly does not do is employ the word "evil" concerning homosexual people or homosexual orientation.

According to Catholic teaching, people of the same sex are incapable of entering the sacrament of marriage. However, CCC 2358 would require that gays not be discriminated against in many areas e.g. employment, health care, welfare, leasing property and hospital visitation of a partner. Sadly, this is not the case in many places and the Church's teaching would regard such treatment as unjust.

Parepidemos - if I owned property, I wouldn't rent it out to active homosexuals, but nor would I rent it out to unmarried sexually active couples, nor to polyamorous relationships. I wouldn't want to support it in any way. In the sane way, I wouldn't rent out a conference room to advocates of abortion or euthanasia either. I wouldn't even rent property to a group who is explicitly anti-Christian or anti-Catholic.

The difference is in saying I do not agree with someone's behavior - and people should be able to discriminate based on behavior. We do all the time. THAT is the difference between being black and being gay.

And this shoul be the right of anyone who doesn't want to support such behavior - whether it's the owner of a bed and breakfast, a florist approached about wedding arrangements, or anything like that.

The sentence before the one you cite from the CCC make clear Church teaching is based upon scripture which has always described homosexual acts as acts of "grave depravity."

Likewise the CDF document explicitly condemns homosexual acts as evil. Mortal sin, or acts of grave depravity are evil. I'm not suggesting that the person is evil, nor does the CDF.

In no way does the document I cite contradict the CCC 2358 which actually states it this way: "Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided."

Discrimination is not an evil in itself. Truth be told, there are examples of how the Church does indeed discriminate as regards hiring for certain Catholic parish/school based employment, both in cases of active homosexuals and others who reject Church doctrine.

Parepidemos - would it be wrong for tge church to not allow actively gay people (not people attracted to tge sane sex but people actively and openly living a life of gay sex, promiscuous or otherwise?) to be employed in Catholic organizations and schools? If not, why should such a right not be extended to anyone who owns a business?

Did I make out the Cardinal's apology to be funny? That wasn't my intent. I think I was really pointing out that the the tactics of intimidation and coercion actually worked in that situation, which culminated in the Cardinal apologizing as well as offering a false hope that a discussion is still open regarding Church teaching on same sex marriage and homosexual acts.

Church teaching can no more change on that than it can on the ordination of women.

Do you really think it was intimidation that prompted him to apologize, or Christian responsibility (i.e., reconciliation)?

Further, I don't know about your Franciscan charism, but mine calls me, calls us all- to conversation. To dialogue. A lot of people are afraid of talking and listening, but Francis, and his predecessors still today, call us to no less. I can send you some links if you're interested.

What, then, justifies an accusation of intimidation against Cardinal George?

Many prayers are needed for our country's leaders. Our Lady of Medjugorje calls us to peace of heart through fasting, the Rosary, reading the Bible, confession and conversion. I think if we all put her message into practice we can not only change our country, but the whole world.Peace

It really boils down to a question of "being." One cannot intrinsically "be" gay, because it is not "who you are" and one is not 'born that way.' There is zero evidence that one is genetically predetermined to "be" a homosexual.

"Today, the Church... refuses to consider the person as a "heterosexual "or a "homosexual," and insists that every person has a fundamental identity: the creature of God, and by grace, His child and heir to eternal life." CDF, no.16

The Church won't put a label on anyone. To say someone is "gay" or "lesbian" or a "homosexual" is to define a whole person by just one aspect. It can lock up a person's identity and block further emotional growth. That's just the sort of labeling which gives rise to prejudice and discrimination. The Church stands against any behavior it calls immoral, but always teaches support and respect for the person. Labeling limits and disrespects people. - Courage website.

"The Church won't put a label on anyone. To say someone is "gay" or "lesbian" or a "homosexual" is to define a whole person by just one aspect. It can lock up a person's identity and block further emotional growth. That's just the sort of labeling which gives rise to prejudice and discrimination. "

I agree with Terry. Identifying as 'gay' is not just a characteristic trait like you listed, Thom. For those who live the gay life (read: approve of & practice homosexual sex sans regret), 'GAY' is who and what they are. Anything else they may see themselves as tends to be pretty incidental. It took me a long time to extricate myself from that, and sometimes I still catch myself slipping backwards, longing for the fleshpots of Egypt. I need constant reminding that I am a child of God. Period. He made me to be ordered towards the good and pure and just. Any thing that takes me away from that, leads me off the path towards God, is not of God and sinful.

Veritatis Splendor

About Me

... My idea of what I am is falsified by my preoccupation about what I do. And my illusions about myself are bred by contagion from the illusions of other men. We all seek to emulate one anothers imagined greatness....If I do not know who I am, it is because I think I am the sort of person everyone around me wants me to be. I have asked myself whether I wanted to become what everybody else seems to want to become... only to realize that I do not admire what everyone else seems to admire. I have only thus begun to live after all... But it is very late. - Adapted from a quote by Thomas Merton

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Show us your face and we shall be saved. "Each soul is the object of My special love. That is why I am so grateful to those who are resourceful and bringing back sinners to Me. Keep this in mind then. I gave My life for them in the most atrocious torture, for these poor beloved ones. A humble repentance, and they are already on My heart. So speak gently to them. Speak with tenderness. A brusque remark could drive them farther away." - He and I

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